June 29-July 1, 2013 Pastor Timothy J. Spaude Text: 1 Kings 19:13b-18

PENTECOST 6

June 29-July 1, 2013

Pastor Timothy J. Spaude

Text: 1 Kings 19:13b-18

“WE’RE NOT THE ONLY ONES LEFT!”

1.     We have the Lord.

2.     We have each other.

3.     We have work to do.

1 Kings 19:13b-18 (NIV 1984) “Then a voice said to him, "What are you doing here, Elijah?" 14 He replied, "I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too." 15 The LORD said to him, "Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16 Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. 17 Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu. 18 Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel--all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him."

          You would think this he would have been at one of the high points of his career. Who, you ask? Elijah, the prophet of Israel. He’s one of the few that God allowed to do miracles to authenticate his message. He should have bouncing off the walls from adrenalin packed excitement rather than lying on the floor of a cave in dejection and despair. Why you ask? Well you can read the whole story in 1 Kings chapter 18 and you will want to because it’s a good one. Briefly it contains the showdown between Elijah, the prophet of the one true God, and the 450 prophets of the idol Baal. With the people of Israel watching the Lord proved He is the one true God. Two altars were set up. One for Baal. One for the Lord. The prophets of Baal got to call on Baal to send fire on their sacrifice for hours and nothing happened. Then came Elijah’s turn. One simple prayer and God dramatically sent fire from heaven that consumed the sacrifice, the altar, even the soil around it. “The Lord, He is God!” the people shouted and they killed the 450 prophets of the fake god Baal. Awesome! Love it. Why wasn’t Elijah excited? Well wicked King Ahab and evil Queen Jezebel did not like what God did through Elijah. They sent word they would kill Elijah. You would have thought that God’s people who had seen His greatness would have defended Elijah who stood up for what was right. Apparently they just melted, more concerned about what Ahab and Jezebel might do to them than sticking up for their prophet. They didn’t defend Elijah so he ran for his life and at the time of our text was cowering in a cave. When God asked him what he was doing you heard the response. "I have been very zealous for the LORD God Almighty. The Israelites have rejected your covenant, broken down your altars, and put your prophets to death with the sword. I am the only one left, and now they are trying to kill me too."

          Do you feel that way sometimes? Is there an Ahab or Jezebel in your life, your family, your place of work so that evil seems to prosper? Has it happened that discussion at work touched on an issue of morality and you spoke your Bible based beliefs but nobody else joined in to say, “The Lord, He is God. What the Bible says is true.” And you found yourself thinking, “Am I the only one left?” Maybe you were at a family get together and you start realizing the way the conversation is going that Christ isn’t their centerpiece and you find yourself thinking “Am I the only one left?” Chris and the girls and I just got back from a wonderful vacation to Florida. One of the places we visited there was Siesta Key Beach, consistently ranked one of the top beaches in the USA. And it was beautiful! Easy to walk on white sand. Gently sloping ocean access. What God did there was awesome. And man messed it up. We found a place to put our things, stretched out to get some sun. And the group of young people on one side was talking about all their sexual sinning in detail and their drunken exploits. On the other side every third of fourth word was an expletive. Behind us more of the same. We started to wonder. Are we the only ones left? Are we the only ones on this huge beautiful beach who want to honor the Creator and Savior with words and actions? We’re coming up on the 4^th of July. Our nation’s birthday. Freedom. Independence. Some of  you fought to preserve that freedom. You had fathers, brothers, sons, daughters. You hear the same news I do. You see what that freedom is being used for. Protection and promotion of sexual immorality of all kinds. Government laws not only allow abortion but are making abortion and the abortive “morning after” pill as easily accessible as possible. God says that’s wrong. So we say it’s wrong. What’s going on? Are we the only ones left?

          Out of the cave brothers and sisters. No lying on the ground in dejection and despair. Hear the Word of the Lord. As it applied to Elijah it applies to us. God says we’re not the only ones left! First we have the Lord. Elijah should have known that. It was 1 Elijah versus 450 prophets of Baal. Who won? Elijah. Why? It wasn’t because the Lord was on Elijah’s side but rather Elijah was on the side of the Lord. And God plus 1 is always a majority. You too can stand up to the Ahab’s and Jezebel’s in your life. God let Ahab and Jezebel have their day, seem to get away with it for years but his calling to account led to their awful death. Elijah ran in fear but the Lord came to him and gave him the encouraging word. That same Lord is with you. He comes to you. Hear His words. “I am with you always, even to the end of the age. I am your shield and your great reward. I will never leave you nor forsake you.”  But then you might think about your sins. You see it’s not just other people on the beach who ruin what God has beautifully created. We do too. God gives us the beautiful gift of marriage, family, friendships, work, church. We make it dirty with our sins. We are not better than anyone else. But we have the Lord who is the Savior God. He became one of us and took our sins on Himself and was punished in full. He has given us his holiness to wear as a robe to assure us He is with us, to help fight the sin in our lives and stop those marriage, family, friendship, work, church destroying sins. We’re not the only ones left. We have the Lord.

          We have each other. Elijah thought that because no one stood up for him he was the only one left. Not true. “Yet I reserve seven thousand in Israel--all whose knees have not bowed down to Baal and all whose mouths have not kissed him." To some extent we can’t blame Elijah. He judged by what he saw. Now he needed to judge by what God said. Elijah was wrong times 7000. We’re also wrong when we feel like we are the only ones left. The Lord has blessed us with each other to support and encourage, to rebuke and admonish when necessary. It was sure nice for the Spaude family to be on vacation, to get some rest from responsibility for a while, but we missed you, our church family. Here we don’t have to worry that our ears will be exposed to foul language or that we will have to see men kissing. Here we are with people who say, “The Lord, He is God,” and mean it. Here are people who will join us in standing up for what is right, in resisting the Ahabs and Jezebels of the world, people who will stand us, stand up for Jesus. What a blessing to have a church family, to have each other, people who will join us in doing the Lord’s work.

          And we have work to do just like Elijah did. “The LORD said to him, "Go back the way you came, and go to the Desert of Damascus. When you get there, anoint Hazael king over Aram. 16 Also, anoint Jehu son of Nimshi king over Israel, and anoint Elisha son of Shaphat from Abel Meholah to succeed you as prophet. 17 Jehu will put to death any who escape the sword of Hazael, and Elisha will put to death any who escape the sword of Jehu.” Elijah was not the only one left. He was to go and put into service others who would do the work of the Lord with him. Hazael, Jehu and Elisha would take care of the wickedness Ahab and Jezebel had spread. The same thing is going on today. The Lord gives us work to because we are not the only ones left nor will we be. When I look at what’s going on in our country I put it this way. I’m sad as an American. I love my country. I’m sad it’s not honoring Jesus. But I’m confident as a Christian. The Lord He is God and Jesus wins. Always.  I have always been as strong proponent of Christian Education of our youth. What I see in our country makes me even stronger. We need to give our children the strongest foundation in God’s Word that we possibly can. If my daughters were going in the military I would want them to have the best training, body armor and weapons money could buy. We need to want the best for our children spiritually as they will apparently live in a country that will continue to grow more and more godless. But they won’t be the only ones left. They’ll have the Lord, each other and their own work to do. We’re not the only ones left.

          Take that encouraging message with you, people of God, as you leave this safe place and go back to your own little corner of the USA. We love our country. We want the best for it. The Lord put us here to make a difference. No cowering in caves. No self-catered Christian pity parties. No whining. No complaining. No chicken little. Instead go to fight your Christian battles with comfort, confidence, peace, joy always because we’re not the only ones left. We have the Lord, each other and His blessed work to do. Let’s be zealous for it. Amen.